


tratyc

by ScreechTheMighty



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, The Mandalorian (TV)
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Mandalorian Language, boba fett tries his best, crisis of culture, mixing legacy EU and canon EU, no beta reader we die like men, old school mando fan-dos where y'all at, or something kind of like comfort, spoilers for chapter 15 (the believer)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-13
Updated: 2020-12-13
Packaged: 2021-03-10 19:00:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,647
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28042035
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ScreechTheMighty/pseuds/ScreechTheMighty
Summary: [Definition: in a state of collapse.]Din Djarin grapples with the ramifications of his actions on Morak. Unfortunately--or perhaps fortunately--the only person awake to help is one Boba Fett.
Comments: 21
Kudos: 209





	tratyc

**Author's Note:**

> If there's anyone who's got any input on the use of Mandalorian in this fic, I welcome it. I swear, I did my best with the one sentence I cobbled together myself, but I'm not a lingusitics person and the Mandalorian dictionary I have saved from literally over a decade ago wasn't much help. I think the grammar guide has been lost to time. Send help.

Boba knew his ship like he knew his own body. Every creak, every chirp of the control panel, every movement registered as clearly as a heartbeat. He could tell when something was wrong, almost like a sixth sense.

The only thing that kept him from going for a weapon when that sense said _someone_ was moving around was the knowledge that they were in hyperspace. Meant it had to be one of their little group. Boba dragged himself out of the pilot’s seat and looked around. Dune was asleep. Shand, also asleep.

No sign of man who only seemed to go by Mando.

Boba sighed at the realization. Sure, he still owed the guy a debt, but that didn’t mean he could wander around the ship unattended. That aside, Boba was… _worried_ was the wrong word. He didn’t know the man well enough to worry. But Dune did, and she’d picked up on something. She’d been hovering near Mando since Morak, like she was trying to protect him from something.

There were only so many places to go, so Boba started with the hold. He made it halfway down the ladder before he heard something. A quiet rasp of breathing, quick and panicked. He _knew_ that sound; knew it a bit too well, actually.

 _Ah, hell._ Should he turn around? Whatever Mando was going through wasn’t any of _his_ business. Boba thought about it, then kept climbing down. They all needed their heads on straight if they wanted to pull this off. He just wanted to make sure whatever _moment_ Mando was having wasn’t going to screw them over later on.

It was dark in the hold, dark enough that Boba’s eyes took a second to adjust. He could make out the Mando’s armor, glinting in what little light filled the space. “Hey, uh…” Boba cleared his throat and spoke up. “You hurt or…?”

Mando froze. And _that_ was when Boba realized he wasn’t wearing the helmet. All he saw was the back of the head, dark brown hair as tousled as one would expect from his situation, but it was more than he’d expected…and definitely more than the man wanted seen.

“ _Usen’ye!_ ” The Mando’s voice cracked on the word. He sounded a mess. _Damn, what have I walked into?_ It couldn’t have just been about the helmet.

“I’m not looking.” Boba made a point of turning around. He wasn’t sure if Mando believed him, but it seemed the polite thing to do. “Just wanted to make sure you were okay.”

“I’m _fine_.”

“Uh-huh. That’s why you’re cursing me out on my own ship.”

There was a pause, almost startled one, like he’d forgotten he wasn’t the only Mandalorian on board. “…sorry.”

“ _N’baatir._ [Don’t worry.]” Boba waved him off. “If you just need a minute, I can go. Just making sure...”

Mando was silent.

“…okay, just…get some rest eventually…”

“Can I ask you something? About your father?”

…unexpected question. And not a fully welcome one. Boba really thought about telling him to mind his own damn business, but the man’s tone was so… _broken_. Boba knew that sound, too.

“Depends on what you’re asking,” Boba said cautiously.

“When he…raised you. What did he teach you about our people?”

… _fine. But only because I’m curious where you’re going with this._

“What Jaster taught him.” Boba looked for a place to sit that kept the Mando out of his line of sight. His knees were acting up again and he wasn’t sure how long this conversation was going to last. “How to fight. Armor care. Stories about how it was, back in his day.” He sat down carefully. _Getting too old for this shit._ “Before Galidraan, and what he remembered of the Schism.”

“When the heretics took over Mandalore?”

“ _Dar’manda_ was his word for it…” He saw Mando flinch out of the corner of his eye. Of course he’d be familiar with the word. To be _dar’manda_ was a worse state than cowardice, and that was the highest insult you could give a person. It was a person who’d lost or abandoned their culture, and their souls with it. The only time Boba had ever heard Dad use the word was with the so-called _New Mandalorians_ , which told him a lot about what sort of people they were. “…but yeah. That.”

Mando was quiet again. Boba heard the clinking of armor; sounded like he was sitting down. “How much of…the Creed? The old ways?”

That one Boba had to think about. “A little bit. Here and there. It was ancient history for him…not so much for your people, it sounds like.” Boba fought the urge to look the other man’s way, try to get a read for where he was emotionally. “I’m not judging, by the way. Don’t think I have any right to.”

Mando hummed quietly. He still hadn’t put the helmet back on. _Odd._ “It’s…the only way I’ve ever…” He cleared his throat. “If the others knew…”

“I didn’t see your face.”

“It’s not just you. It’s…” The pain was back in full force. “There was a terminal. I was the only one who could access it, but it needed a facial scan…Mayfield, _aruetiise, val haa'taylir_ …[Mayfield, the outsiders, they saw…]”

 _Ah, shit._ Explained why he was so worked up, but still. _You’d better not have a panic attack right now._ Boba wasn’t equipped for that. _No one_ on this damn ship seemed like they were equipped for that. “Hey, hey, take it easy. Breathe.” That, at least, seemed to get to the guy; he stopped mid-sentence and took a few shaky breaths. “If you’re that worried, we can go back and kill Mayfield once we’re done. He’d be the only one left, yeah? And I doubt he got very far.” Boba gave himself a 50-50 shot the joke would land. Seemed he was still the luckiest son of a bitch in the galaxy, because it got Mando to laugh a bit. “I mean it.”

“No. No, it’s…it doesn’t change anything. But thanks.”

“No problem.” Good; didn’t sound like he was going to lose it, for now, at least. Boba wanted to make sure that was _permanent_ , so he chose his next words carefully. “This kid means that much to you?”

“…yeah. I used to think I’d rather die than break the Creed, but…I didn’t even think. I just did it. I threw it all away and I didn’t think twice.”

That was the problem. Boba knew how _he_ felt about the whole thing, how Dad would’ve felt if he could hear this…even liked to think he know how his _ba’buir_ would’ve felt, even though he only knew Jaster from stories. But this guy had his mind made up, or he _thought_ he had. Wasn’t so simple for him.

Still. Boba could _try_.

“ _Aliit ori'shya tal'din._ [Family is more than blood.] They teach you that one?”

“Of course they did.”

“And your clan is the most important thing. You look after your own, no matter what. That’s what you were doing, yeah? The kid’s your clan, you did what you had to. Seems like you were sticking to one of the most important parts of the Creed. Way more important than the helmet.” He might have been toeing the line with that one, but when there was no protest, Boba decided to keep talking. “Look, after…the Schism, after Galidraan, we had to adapt. That’s what Dad said. The core of who we are stayed the same, but some things changed. That’s normal. Nothing wrong with it. Nothing wrong with following the old ways, if that’s what you want, but if they have a problem with what you did, or you don’t want to do it anymore…plenty of other Mandalorians who’d have no problem with you. You wouldn’t be _dar’manda,_ not by a long shot.”

Silence fell over the hold, broken only occasionally by the clinking of armor. “I don’t know what I want,” the other man said quietly. “I just…need to get him back.”

 _Fair enough_. “You can work it out once we do,” Boba said. “Think the best thing you can do is put that bucket of yours back on and keep it together for your boy. When it’s over…think about it. But I won’t rat you out if you decide to stay with them.”

Another pause. Boba heard the man stand, the familiar click and hiss of a helmet settling back into place. When the man spoke, his voice was much steadier. “ _Vor entye._ [Thank you.]”

“ _Ba'gedet'ye._ [You’re welcome.]” Honestly, Boba was amazed he remembered so much of the language. It was the most he’d spoken of it in years. At least all of Dad’s lessons hadn’t gone to waste. “Just didn’t want you losing it right before a mission.”

“I’ll be all right.” Mando stopped to offer Boba a hand up; Boba accepted, because he wasn’t _too_ proud. “And it’s...Djarin. Din Djarin.”

 _About damn time._ “ _Su cuy'gar_ , Djarin.” The literal meaning of the greeting, _you’re still alive_ , felt fitting. _It’s just a helmet. You’re still here._ “You’d better get some sleep. Going to be a hell of a day.”

He probably wouldn’t, but Boba couldn’t blame him. He wouldn’t be sleeping much if it was his family. He settled for making sure Djarin was settled down back in his corner, that he wasn’t on the verge of breaking again, and that they were still on course for Moff Gideon’s position. The important details.

Djarin could have a cultural crisis later. And Boba wished him luck with that, truly. He’d had to figure it out himself after he lost Dad and was starting to make his own way in the world. He’d managed to come to terms with it, to find his own way.

Hopefully, Djarin could do the same.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm on tumblr as screechthemighty, where right now the theme of my life is "grumpy dads that come from cultures that emphasize warfare try to take care of their tiny adorable sons" (God of War and also the Mandalorian). Also, writing this slam-dunked me back into being a baby teenage Mando fan, so that was a fun experience.
> 
> Of the words I left untranslated, _usen'ye_ , is clarified to be a very rude way of telling someone to go away; since the dictionary file I have keeps things PG, I assume they're implying it's something along the lines of "piss off." _Ba'buir_ is grandfather, and can I say? Freaking fantastic that Jaster Mereel is canon again, kinda. Another linguistic note is that _vor entye_ literally translates to "I accept a debt" so of course that's the one I had to go for.
> 
> Also, Galidraan is a reference to the Battle of Galidraan which NEEDS to be canon again because it'd add so much to the universe and explain a lot of things about the different fractured Mandalorian sects and such. Dave? Jon? Are you listening?? Make Galidraan canon again, PLEASE.


End file.
